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Academic Technology

#68 - Get students to share and vote on ideas, opinions, proposals, answers etc. in class

  1. Students might feel disengaged, disempowered, without a voice in big lectures.
  2. Getting everyone involved in decision making or sharing their thoughts is a challenge when you have large numbers.
  3. Engagement is good, but we need to do it efficiently and fairly.

Category: Teach in-class or online Run sessions in physical classrooms

Enhancement goals addressed: Active learning | Responsive teaching | Engaged students | Valuing student contributions

Tools and how to get support: Vevox

Solution overview

The Vevox personal response system includes a Q&A channel, through which you can gather responses from students. You might, for example, ask them to say which topics they would like to cover in a revision session. The students share their messages in the Q&A channel in Vevox, using their own devices (phone, tablet, computer). They can then "like" each other's messages to show which are the most popular suggestions. The messages can be shown on the big screen in order of most liked, and you can then respond to the students.

Process
  1. Follow the link to Vevox in the tools section below for comprehensive guidance and support in using Vevox.
  2. You will need a Vevox account for this. You can get a free account for groups up to 100, but with limited functionality. Or you may be able to get a fully licensed account from the Academic Technology team.
  3. Create a Vevox meeting for your lecture, and remember to start the meeting beforehand.
  4. You can switch off Q&A until you are ready for the students to use it (in the settings for Q&A in the dashboard). You can also switch on moderation, meaning that you have to approve messages before they are seen by everyone else. This will mean that you have to be quick in approving messages if you have a large group of students. Go into Present mode on the Vevox dashboard, and order the messages by "most likes" (in the Layout menu at the bottom of the screen, if it isn't there move your mouse to the bottom of the screen and it will appear).
  5. When you are ready, give the students clear instructions on what you want them to write about. Give them time to write. Then give them instructions as to how to evaluate and vote on the messages that they see shared from other students.
  6. Respond as required.
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